Tattoo Removal

White blood cells can be classified as belonging to 2 main groups - agranulocytes and granulocytes

One of the types, the granulocytes, are capable of amoeboid movement.
The most common type of granulocyte, the neutrophils, move to infected parts of the body to engulf and consume invading bacteria. These also engulf and consume the dispersed particles of laser-blasted tattoo ink.

For four months, the neutrophils in Tara's body digested ink particles,
and in January, 2003, her arm was ready for another session with the lasers.

Corina
and I accompanied Tara on this visit.

Corina and I both went out and bought goggles like these after this
session. We also got straw hats, fanny packs and those leather cases for cell phones.

Shea was out on maternity leave, so Heidi conducted the session.

She used the Nd:YAG first.

Then
the ruby laser.

Tara
was in pain during the treatments.

She described the pain of laser treatment as similar to hot bacon
grease hitting her arm.

The raised skin.

At the end of the third session, covered again in desensitizing (and
probably anti-bacterial) gel.

The sessions don't take long, but the wait between them is considerable,
and there is no way to hurry them up. Going in once every three months is
about as frequently as your skin can recover from the laser attack.

The skin blistered later in the day, but I wasn't around to take photos
that time either.